


Strangers

by Cyrelia_J



Series: Garak/Bashir AUs [3]
Category: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Genre: Alien Biology, Alternate Reality, Anal Sex, Blood and Violence, Body Modification, Choking, Dark, Disturbing Themes, Drunk Sex, Explicit Language, Explicit Sexual Content, Graphic Description of Corpses, M/M, Minor Character Death, Murder Kink, Oral Sex, Out of Character, Religious Content, Rough Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-29
Updated: 2018-04-10
Packaged: 2019-04-14 10:33:12
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 8,299
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14134269
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cyrelia_J/pseuds/Cyrelia_J
Summary: Inspired by Hitchcock's "Strangers on a Train"...Two strangers meet on a space station and find they have something unusual in common. They both hate their fathers and they both want them dead. They get drunk. They screw. They make an arrangement.“It’s so simple, my dear. Say a couple of fellows meet accidentally like you and me. No connection between them at all. Never saw each other before. Each of them has somebody he'd like to get rid of, but he can't murder the person he wants to get rid of. He'll get caught. So they swap murders.”(added a final chapter three, that's full of crazy disturbing smut- heed tags)





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This idea got stuck in my head and bam, here you go. A big shout out for everyone supporting this crazy idea. I also definitely want to give credit to TangentialMango’s “Pull Me Back” for inspiring a big part of the narrative and reason for Julian’s character and behavior. I had gotten the idea for the gene pair switching and in a sense, I think this could also be the Julian in that fic's worst fear some to life in a way. In any case, this is a bit dark and twisted so enjoy!

Their feet bump in the crowded replimat: Julian Bashir and Elim Garak. They’re seated at the same table by necessity, an unusual amount of patrons filling the busy space. Julian looks up first to the stranger offering an apology. Across the table, Garak smiles at him taking note of the young man. He’d been absorbed in his reading but now puts his full attention on Julian.

“There’s no need to apologize. I should hope that every day the worst fate to befall me is an unexpected jostle from a handsome young man.” Julian blinks at him in surprise. He hadn’t expected the older Cardassian to respond in such a manner and he clears his throat taking a drink of his tea, unsure of how to answer. “You’re Doctor Bashir, are you not?” Garak asks him pleasantly and Julian nearly spills it.

“I... I am but ah... have we met? I usually don’t forget a face but there’s a first time for everything, right?” He smiles a bit. Garak smiles back.

“We haven’t met, Doctor so rest assured that you’ve given no offense. My name is Garak. I’m a tailor passing through on some business and I happened to recall seeing your picture on the news feeds back home. You’re quite famous on Cardassia Prime you know.” Julian looks sheepish as he resumes drinking his tea.

“It’s nothing really, just a few reporters thinking that medicine is this big glamorous show you know. I can’t take the credit all on my own for the work that all of us have done on Potrikk Syndrome. Are you on your way to Cardassia City as well?”

“I’m a man without a country as some would say,” Garak offers. Julian blinks at him.

“That’s Hale. You’ve actually read Hale?” he asks looking immensely pleased.

“When one finds himself with an abundance of free time, reading is one of those long honored and noble past times. I’ve read a myriad of authors from Earth, from Vulcan, from Ferenginar- though I don’t have to tell you that Ferengi literature can be woefully one dimensional.”

“But not if you’re lucky enough to get your hands on the lascivious courtesan literature.” 

“Of course, one must know where to source such tales given the underground channels they’re published through.”

“Ishka’s Latinum Trace! Have you read it?” Julian asks, tea forgotten. Garak beams back and tells him that he has. He asks if Julian has ever read any Chandler? The old human detective stories have been a guilty pleasure of his, he confesses citing Hammett and even Macdonald. Julian has to admit ignorance but Garak promises not to hold it against him. They both pause, talking over each other in an invite back to each other’s quarters. They decide to meet in Julian’s and continue their lunch away from the bustle of the replimat.

 

They get drunk on kanar. Julian finds the thick syrupy drink almost too sweet but it slips like mercury down his throat like it has a mind of its own. It makes him warm. It makes him dizzy. Garak convinces him to turn up the heat controls in his room. Julian agrees almost half asleep listening to Garak speak rhythmically of the Earth authors they’ve in common like Poe. Garak says as Julian sits across from him that only a human would allow himself to be trapped in such a psychological prison of his own making. Julian laughs softly at that and puts a hand on Garak’s knee. He nearly falls into him when he does.

“Oh well that’s because you know... if you’re not suited for that sort of thing I imagine it must be so terribly jarring to the senses. You know...” He grins at Garak.

“That sort of thing?” Garak sips his kanar as if he could imbibe another bottle without a hair out of place. “You mean murder?” His voice drops and Julian giggles, laughing full out when Garak gives an eerie waggle of his fingers.

“Yes, you know, I think there has to be some sort of person suited to that level of cold cal... cal... coolating. They’ve done studies you know. Hundreds of studies, thousands, trying to see what property of the brain causes those sorts of thoughts and in all our vaunted medical advancements-“ Julian waves a wild arm skywards, ending up with his head comically turned to Garak viewing him sideways. “Nothing. It’s a blank you know.”

“I know?”

“Or maybe _I_ know... Mmm, no, what I know is that you’re much too far over there,” Julian grumbles, using Garak’s leg as an anchor to drag himself over. He moves next to him on the sofa with a hard _thud_. “Better. You were saying?” Garak takes Julian’s hand and removes the glass. He sets the glass down on the table. 

“I think you may have had enough, dear doctor.”

“Oh, I’ll tell you when it’s enough, Garak. And it’s not enough by far. I’m only staying on Cardassia Prime a month and then I... I have to return home. It’s my father you see,” Julian says with a drawn out sigh. Garak listens to him, letting Julian continue to intertwine their hands. “He’s a miserable old sod, a completely selfish, manipulative, horrible _cunt_ of a man who thinks that he owns my entire life.” Julian decides it would be most brilliant to rub Garak’s hand against the side of his face. The ridges feel nice. Garak thinks that Julian’s feverish skin feels nice as well. 

“I’m to be married once my “little excursion” is over you know. Some girl I’ve never met, don’t care to meet who I understand is a thorough bore and intellectual void if you believe my cousin Alastair and I...” Julian gives him a grin that surely should be the epitome of sex except it’s a bit too lopsided to quite be there. “I’m going to blow every bloke that looks my way from here til’ the old man has them drag me back, you know that? Good old gift for the old bugger who’s never understood that I... I’m sorry, I trailed off a bit there”

Garak blinks at him looking terribly amused.

“Is that where I fall into this adventure then? A  boxcar on the sophomoric rebellion train?” 

“You!” Julian exclaims with an exaggerated point of a finger, “are the conductor! All aboard the Julian Bashir express, I say.” Julian laughs again into his shoulder and his mouth stars playing with the ridges on Garak’s neck, alternating bite, suck, until Garak has to insist that he stop. 

“I can sympathize, you know. I too know a thing or too about the unfortunate dynamic of an unenviable relationship with ones’ sire. But to your earlier point,” Garak says, giving Julian a playful shove back, “you seem to think there’s some magical murderer’s key that science has yet to uncover?” Julians sobers a moments, eyes almost crossed prettily in thought.

“Well I don’t see what else it would be. That is... that would be why people... I mean why you and _I_ can go through our entire lives without a single murderous intention.”

Garak raises a daring brow ridge in his direction, and takes a long sip of kanar.

“Who’s to say that we’ve never had any of that insidious intent? Perhaps you’re merely suppressing those thoughts because they frighten you.”

“Me? Frightened of something like that? Ha!” Julian reached for the glass only to find it floating away in Garak’s hand. Garak drinks them both in front of him. “Nothing scares Julian Bashir, intergalactic spy, man of mystery, perfectly engineered little something or other. Oh, you drank it all...” he says with a frown.

“Perhaps not scared then, perhaps merely wise as the the practicality of such matters but... I tend to think that everyone is a potential murderer. Something I’ve witnessed firsthand. Have you ever planned a wedding, dear doctor? Oh, not your own doomed nuptials, that was insensitive of me. Well let me assure you I’ve done my share of those, shall we say red weddings. I don’t doubt the true nature of sentient creatures when they feel a threat imagined or otherwise.”

“If I concede your point, do you think I might have a bit of snog?” Julian asks hands starting to go back to wandering. Garak finds his loosening language to be charming. Not such the cultured doctor now.

“Tell me you’ve dreamed of killing some of those useless bureaucrats you’ve had to work with at the Academy in Lacoria City and I’ll consider it.” Julian grins at him wickedly.

“Now we can’t just go around killing people because they’re useless Garak,” he lectures loftily while his long fingers try and work the complicated fastenings. “But now if we’re speaking in the hypotheticals I’d like to push the lot of them off that high tower at the north wing and watch the silly gits try and fucking fly.” Julian giggles, a titter as he figures out fastening one and two. “Do I get my-”

Garak’s mouth is no his, not letting him finish. He tastes kanar and Julian is happily trying to push his tongue down Garak’s throat. Garak bites it. Julian growls. Garak drags him onto his lap. Julian is surprisingly heavy it feels good. 

“And your father?” Garak asks when Julian sits back, eyes bright and beautiful. Julian looks back at him seeing the slitted pupils.

“I fucking adore your eyes.” Julian answers dreamily. “You know my father can’t fly either. Doesn’t fly. Afraid of heights. Afraid of so many stupid things. But I can’t kill him you know.”

“The matter of motive?”

“Oh... I suppose there’s that as well but you know... whatever the reasons sons don’t kill their fathers. I should hate to have to sleep with my mother.”

“I assure you, my dear in this scenario that isn’t necessary.”

“Right, right then off with ‘is ‘ead, eh?” Julian smiles wide and makes a cutting motion laughing obscenely. “Like the Queen of Hearts, I am. Off with ‘is bloody ‘ead!”

Julian’s head is thrown back, lovely teeth, lovely throat and Garak puts his mouth to it.

“Then why don’t I tell you the plan, my dear?”

“Plan? I thought I was the train... er... no, that’s not right, you’re the train and I’m the conductor. All aboard and all that, that’s what I told you,” Julian says with a bit of a bounce. Garak’s hands find themselves on that small, firm little ass.

“I think we’ve resolved the matter of that one already, doctor, no. I mean the master plan in all of this.”

“Oh there’s more?” Julian asks looking intrigued.

“Shall I tell you about it?” Garak asks feeling lovely pressure, almost tempted to evert at the thought of it.

“Go on then.”

“It’s so simple, my dear. Say a couple of fellows meet accidentally like you and me. No connection between them at all. Never saw each other before. Each of them has somebody he'd like to get rid of, but he can't murder the person he wants to get rid of. He'll get caught. So they swap murders.”

“Swap murders?” There’s a little furrow to Julian’s brow that’s precious. He almost looks like he might be sobering up.

“Exactly, I knew you were a smart boy when I saw you. Each fellow does the other fellow's murder.  Then there is nothing to connect them. The one who had the motive isn't there.  Each fellow murders a total stranger. Like you do my murder and I do yours.”

“Think you might be reading too many of those old books Garak. Haven’t you read any good books, you know like ah... mmm... wait wait I... I know this,” Julian wiggles. Wiggling is nice. Garak cannot imagine what sort of monster would waste this lovely creature on some useless milksop of a human woman. “Oh you’re one of those blokes who gets off on the weird murder stuff, right? Like I tell you how I’m gonna do in your old man and it gives you a nice little stiffie there.” Julian has undone the buttons, his mouth back to the ridges of Garak’s neck, moving up to his ear. Julian is right, it _is_ exciting him enough to evert.

“So I say to you that I’m... I’m on Cardassian Prime and you haven’t told me about your father, but if he’s anything like mine, I’m sure he’s a domineering old bastard that thinks he’s fucking immortal think he’s gonna live on through you and he won’t know otherwise til someone sticks ‘im good with a pair of scissors?”

“Scissssorsss?” Garak hisses as Julian’s hands start rubbing over his chest. The surprised face of Enabran Tain with a pair of fabric scissors sticking out of his chest would be such a beautiful irony. His _prUt_ agrees.

“Yeah, I’ll stick ‘im good, promise, Garak... you gonna stick my old man then? Stick me. I’m very flexible. You can thank him for that too. Get my ankles around my neck and you can drive it in real deep.” Julian’s mouth is on his again hungrily. Julian doesn’t know where to attack first. Garak does. Humans are simple, predictable creatures. 

He reaches between them hands down the front of Julian’s trousers right to his prick.

“You’re so drunk you’re not going to remember this are you?”

“I never forget anything, Garak,” he whispers, trembling, his prick throbbing in Garak’s hand. “It’s what they did to me you know... them making me like this... but I trust you so... I’ll let you in on a wee ickle secret, luv...” His voice drops. “I’m actually a monster. An awful, awful monster.”

“Oh no no no, my dear, you’re exactly what I need tonight.”

“That’s me. All things to all men... summat like that.”

“Cardassians don’t believe in sin, dear doctor.”

“Ah good... ‘m about to sin something fierce then if you don’t think I’m too pissed.”

“You like that then? My idea? I think we’re both speaking the same language, aren’t we, doctor?” He squeezes. Julian squeezes his shoulders and nods.

“Yes... oh yes... whatever you want just-”

“My father, your father. Criss cross.”

“Easy peasy lemon squeezy,” Julian agrees half moaning. “The old man says that  he curated that stupid saying from some old book. My father thinks he’s terribly clever you know... I’m not calling you daddy,” Julian says suddenly changing that direction. “I don’t care how good you give it to me I... Oh... shit... sorry, I lied. do that again, I swear I’ll call you whatever the devil you want.” Garak does. Julian sings prettily into his ear.

“I’m going to Earth. You’re going to Cardassia. You think my theory is okay then, Julian? You like it?” 

“I like everything, Garak. Remember that’s me, jolly good time ’til I go home then it’s the Jolly Roger for me. Don’t stop... ah fuck, don’t stop.”

“I’ll never stop if you don’t want me to.”

“Don’t.”

“Come for me, Julian.”

“Fuck yes.”

“We understand then? We agree.”

“Yes Ah... Ah!”

“Good.”

* * *

 

Garak looks at the small lighter as he steps outside the Earth terminal.The piece is an old family heirloom, Julian had said. He explains it was used for some old vice of lighting addictive burning tobacco sticks. It’s silver, a doctor’s symbol ironically enough simply saying “Bashir” on it. He smiles.

 “Nice meeting you, Julian.”

Garak flicks the lighter looking at the flame. He watches it a moment before letting it go out.

“Criss cross.”

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> One down, One to go

His father is dead. Julian reads the words again and slowly drinks the sweet iced Tarkalian tea. His hand is steady as he reads the details. Unknown assailant... a violent end... bound... tied... hours of agony... a garrote... slow... painful... decapitated... There was care executed- skill for such an operation to be performed so cleanly. His father couldn’t have struggled. Probably a paralytic used. Probably couldn’t have screamed then. Probably died in silent torment. Probably a highly trained individual then performing the execution being that they were one room over from where his mother was sleeping. His father was bound to the chair in his office. The first responders had a poor reaction. His mother was in catatonic shock. Probably still is. Julian yawns and sets the PADD down. 

 

His cock is hard, the tip spilling wetness easily when he takes himself in hand.

 

“Off with his head,” Julian whispers to himself in the silence of his room. The doors to the balcony are open. The lights are off; only the moon bearing witness to him. The nights on Cardassia Prime vacillate between hot and cold. Tonight it’s hot, and a humid breeze blows through the thin curtains. Julian is on the soft chaise, stretched out languidly: nude. He strokes himself slowly, sometimes a palm pressing, massaging his hard cock. His hand slips along the more aroused he becomes- the more his need grows. “Garak,” passes his lips, feet starting to slip over the fabric. His hips twist. “It was you... fuck I know it was you...” The humid air makes it hard to breathe. It’s thick, it’s stifling, like Garak.

Garak had used him so thoroughly that night by the end Julian was completely sober. His body processes alcohol too quickly to stay drunk for long. His mind retains memory like a machine. His body retains tactile sensation like a beloved pleasure doll, wear worn into its manufactured shell. Julian marries the two and lets go, rolling over until his face is buried into a pillow and he’s back on Deep Space Nine. He’s back in those hot quarters and Garak is fucking into him raw and bare until he’s screaming so loud that Garak nearly suffocates him to quiet the noise. Julian had come the hardest when he thought he was going to die. 

He once read a series of books long ago as a child, a man with a big hooked nose declaring that he would teach his students to stopper death. The man had died. Julian had died in a sense as well. He told Garak while they fucked that the French refer to an orgasm as a “little death”. Julian had laughed and said that made Garak some Cardie reaper stealing souls with his prick. Garak had asked if he had Julian’s soul- drove it in really deep when he said it. Julian said that he didn’t believe he had a soul to steal; he was a monster after all, though his mother had said once to that even the demons in Gehenna had souls. So Julian replied that if he had one then yeah he supposed Garak had a part of it as many times as he made Julian come- wet, dry, pain, agony. Garak spilled into him so hard at that Julian still feels a phantom rush of Garak’s seed down his thighs when he remembers.

Julian wasn’t always a monster. Once upon a time he was just a boy who was a little duller, a little slower, a little weaker. Once upon a time he was just a man who was a little smarter, a little faster, a little stronger than everyone else. Once upon a time he had a conscience. Once upon a time he could love, he could grieve, he could spill tears when things died, when things hurt... when he was the one who hurt them. Once upon a time he worried that some nightmare creature had turned him to an immortal demon with a bite to his neck. Once upon a time he woke up and tried to drive a stake through his own heart before he could finish turning. His mother wouldn’t let him die and his father chastised him for not being grateful for the life they had given him.

Julian doesn’t believe in dreams anymore. He doesn’t court fairytales. He doesn’t pray to God. He doesn’t feel fear.  He believes in sex and he believes in death. Sex and death are the only constants, the only two truths in his reality. Everything fucks and everything dies. Sometimes both together. Garak had whispered to him as he stayed there on top, as his hips weighted just so that even Julian’s strength couldn’t move him, that it might arouse him to let Julian die like that. Julian dead on the bed with a stranger’s cock buried in his ass. That’s how his father said he’d meet his end; his profligate wastrel of a son. Julian felt another little twitch of heat when Garak said those words and Julian pictured Garak’s hands around his old man’s neck. Julian’s hips push to the cushion and he lets the pillow continue to steal his breath. 

He used to be afraid. He used to sit up at night afraid to sleep, afraid that when he awoke he would be different again. That was how they had gotten him the first time. He went to bed a child and woke months later a machine. He used to tell himself if he didn’t sleep they couldn’t trap him again. He learned to sleep when they were gone, in spurts, when no one was around. He was afraid of them changing him. And then he learned that it wasn’t them that he needed to fear but his own body; it was his own genetics that were going to turn against him. It was the mutation of his genes, the mere shuffle of the base pairs of SLC6A3. It was the monster mutation that he used to call it that would turn him to a demon that he could never return from. He used to wake up every morning and ask himself the same set of questions, the same series of scenarios to elicit the proper emotional response. He swore to himself that the first time he failed he wouldn’t allow himself to live. But then it happened.

 

And Julian realized that he was no longer afraid.

He doesn’t want to rule the world.

All he wants are sex and death.

 

“Garak... fuck... Garak...” muffled screams into the pillow. He wishes that older doctor that he’d met- Doctor Parmak had taken him up on his subtle entreaties. He doesn’t imagine that Parmak will give him what he needs the way that Garak does but he’s handsome enough. And when it comes right down to it, a shortbread might not be a scrummy bit of Victoria sponge but it’s still sweet and sex is still so lovely even when it’s bland... An arm blindly reaches behind to push fingers in deep, hurting, punishing, Julian seeing spots knowing he’s pushing to even the limits of his lungs as his cock rubs and ruts against the cushion. 

Doctor Parmak thinks that he’s a lovely young man but could surely find someone more suitable if he tries. He has. But someone more suitable is on Earth. Someone more suitable has killed his father and surely cannot be seen with him now; not yet. Someone more suitable has given him more ecstasy that he could handle in one night and given him more being light years away than anyone else. And someone more suitable than someone more suitable does not exist so Julian is left alone in his hot hot room sweaty, wanting, needing something that he can’t rightly have. Except there is a way to have it.

 

That way is Enabran Tain.

 

Julian’s father is dead. Garak cut his fucking head off. Garak spent a night torturing the old cunt’s arrogant hateful fucking head off his shoulders and Julian comes hard just thinking about it hips twitching, body clenching around his fingers that he thinks his heart might stop. He rolls over to his back, the stars dancing around his eyes just as they are outside and his chest is heaving. They say the best orgasm is when one is near death and his hand wraps around his own neck giving just a little squeeze. He wishes it was Garak’s. 

Julian’s fingers drop down then and trace the old scar in the center as he lets his hand fall to his softening sensitive prick, to slip those fingers through semen, to slurp it greedily with a deep, purr. His father wouldn’t allow them to remove the scar making him keep that reminder of his failure. His father is dead and from light years away Garak has just given him one of the best orgasms he’s ever had. And all that’s left now is to hold up his end of the bargain.

 

He has to kill Enabran Tain. 

 

Julian has never met Enabran Tain, hadn’t thought that their talk that night was any more than that. But it was. And Julian may be a lot of things but an oath breaker isn’t one of them. 

“There will be a funeral, surely,” he whispers to that darkened ceiling. “You’re not a good son, Julian. You’re nothing but an ungrateful failure who’s wasted his life on taking on the only enemy that you can’t beat. You don’t have to go when they lay your father to rest but Garak...” Garak is a Cardassian. Cardassians are good devoted sons and Garak will be there. If Julian kills Tain then Julian can see Garak. He smiles and keeps sucking his seed from his hand like honey. He’ll get the rest with his mouth. He once told his father as a defiant teenager that the only thing his enhancements were good for were letting him suck his own prick. His father didn’t hit him often but that was one of those times. Julian laughs. “Well if we put the old noggin’ down there guv, guess you can do it too now.”

Julian hopes that Garak tells him all about it when they meet again. He bites his finger hard thinking of how nice it would be to hear all the gory detail as Garak fucks down his throat. Garak had said that he was too drunk that night to let him have more than a few sucks of that massive pretty prick, that _prUt_ Garak had called it. Julian calls it perfect and can’t wait to choke on it sober. He hopes Garak likes the scrape of his teeth; he scrapes teeth over his index finger as he pushes it back between his lips in a soft moan until it tickles the back of his throat. Julian likes it. Julian likes a lot of things now that he didn’t used to. He breathes deep, and sits up with a sigh, starting to feel restless. He can’t kill Tain yet. This is an operation that requires planning, a delicate touch, consideration but Julian is just so-

 

He jumps at the knock on his door.

The sound knocks his head back into a bit more immediacy.

 

Julian didn’t think he was being terribly loud but there could always be something else.

“Computer, lights,” he says, fetching his robe from its drape over the back of the chaise. It’s a thin bit of satin but he can’t help his propriety at this hour. He belts it tightly as he can before going to answer. Julian supposes that the room might be a bit musky, his hands not better for the wear but there a breeze and well... He opens the door stuffing them in his pockets. 

 

It’s Doctor Parmak after all.

 

Oh. Julian licks his lips.

“Is everything well?” he asks concerned. He imagines all sorts of medical emergencies which may have arisen in the middle of the night and is prepared for either. He waits with a shuffle from one foot to his other giving Doctor Parmak a quick glance. Parmak shakes his head and Julian sees his hair is different from earlier. The long white mass is still pulled back but there are small little lights- beads, that sparkle- braided through. Julian remembers one of the other doctors saying that Parmak is from the north- spoken disdainfully- and that they have odd customs and habits. Parmak smiles and and his head dips, seeming lower because of the slight stoop of his back. He pushes his spectacles up. 

“Yes, I’m sorry, Doctor Bashir I ah... I have this awful habit of wandering at night and I saw your balcony doors were open. I thought you might be up. Oh, you might not have realized that the doors shouldn’t be left unattended,” he muses to himself. “That should have occurred to me but it’s not an emergency I ah... mm... It’s quite possible I misunderstood your invitation earlier as well...” As if that thought is only now occurring to him.

Julian takes a step back letting the breeze blow past whatever scents it may. He watches Parmak’s tongue flick the air and his enhanced eyes catching a telling shift of interested pupils. Parmak’s arms are crossed and a finger trails down the side of his face, considering, caresses ridges absently. A comfort or an unconscious invitation?

“Would you like to come in?” Julian asks, watching him carefully. “I’m afraid I’m not decent but if you can bear it then-” Parmak laughs loudly at that seeming much younger when he does. He’s far more attractive the more Julian studies him. Perhaps he’s more sticky toffee pudding than shortbread.

“I promise you, Doctor Bashir, I don’t have much need for decent company. Have I ever told you about my friend Elim?” Julian shakes his head seeing Parmak’s hands cross behind his back. “Oh, I must a bit... though perhaps not tonight. Mmm, dear Elim is the sort of man one only meets once in a lifetime. Elim Garak, that is, not Elim Temar the poet. I would hate for you to think I know someone that influential... and Temar’s work while ambitious is awfully overrated and I hope you don’t think me unkind for saying so but it’s lacking any real emotion and ah... I can’t imagine you liking him. Don’t mind me.” He waves his hand expressively. Julian finds him so amusing.

“Elim... Garak?” Julian repeats with another step back so that Parmak might come inside.

“Yes! Do you know him?” Parmak asks with a darling smile finally crossing the threshold. Julian returns that expression shutting the door behind them.

“No. We’ve never met. Tell me about him then.”

 

He doesn’t sleep with Parmak that night.

He doesn’t need to.

* * *

 

The shuttle from the Arawath colony is delayed due to a sudden ion storm and doesn’t arrive until the middle of the night. He appreciates the irony of another vital point of death in his life being influenced by an ion storm. Parmak would call it a bright portend. Perhaps he should have slept with him after all. Julian stands back in the spot he’d marked, his mind an overlaid map of every single blind spot to the monitors of the street. It had taken him weeks to parse all the feeds, all the crimes that had happened on this street until he could be sure he knew three places where his face couldn’t be seen. He stands there, reading a PADD, wearing another man’s face. He review his notes, knowing that he’s going to be giving a talk tomorrow on the matter of communicable diseases amongst sex workers in the southern quadrant. Parmak admires his dedication to helping the disenfranchised. Julian thinks it’s ludicrous for any society to fail to recognize the inherent flaws in class biases. Everyone’s the same inside, after all.

 

Everyone but him.

 

Julian checks the time in his head. Any minute now. The weapon is warm in his palm, the metal having since warmed from his body heat long ago. He likes how smooth the blades feet. He made sure test their sharpness earlier: fabric shears, Fiskar classics with a little modification. He smiles.

 “Nice meeting you, Garak.”

He puts the PADD away and gets them ready.

“Criss cross.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I keep batting around ideas for a possible third chapter but thought for now this was a good place to end it so we'll see what happens :)


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The final meeting?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I couldn't resist wrapping this up more finally (kind of)At least this arc of it. This got for lack of a better word pretty sick and pretty fucked up. A lot of graphic depictions of violence and getting off on said violence, murder, etc. If the other two chapters were unsettling this ramps it up quite a bit so be warned. If you're still with me, enjoy!

His father is dead. The body of Enabran Tain lies still in the cold vaulted room resting silently in the heavy metal casket. The ceremony, the lowering into the ground will be tomorrow. The first thing that Garak does is stab the body with a needle to be sure it’s truly dead. The second thing that he does is take a sample of the same blood to be sure the man lying there is really Tain. He looks at the face, blackened, bruised, swollen. It’s clean now but the doctors had let him know that the tongue had been neatly severed with his own teeth. He may have died from choking on it, from swallowing it down. The poison had eroded the cerebellum nicely. Slowly- but he wouldn’t have blacked out from it. There were traces of adrenaline as well with a high concentration around the wound. They said it would have been a mercy if the attacker hadn’t missed the heart. It wasn’t over quickly.

Garak stares silently. The poison was highly concentrated around the wound- stabbing wounds, they said unable to identify the weapon. Garak knew what it was. It was fabric scissors. He pockets the small vial of dark black blood with a small hitch of laughter under his breath. The scissors were driven in hard enough to break a rib, to break two. He wouldn’t have imagined his little bean to be so strong; Garak had held him down so easily the night they fucked, after all. He held him like he was nothing, up down, Julian sinking deep down on his  _prUt_  barely catching his breath as Garak lifted him again, that neck snapping back roughly each time that Garak fucked up into him. Garak thought that he would break him. He didn’t. Julian just bent over breathless and moved Garak’s right hand from his hip to his throat and came when Garak gave a squeeze.

Garak didn’t trust that Julian would do it. One human, one target more or less to him didn’t particularly matter. The only matter was the honor of the arrangement- and Garak thought he might need to persuade his little doctor. He thought that he might need to let the sharp tip of the garrote’s other end trail over Julian’s delicate skin. He thought it might even need to loop it around, pull it tight, feel him tremble, watch the wire dig in until it drew blood and Julian… came. Garak was tempted that night. Julian begged him harder, always harder, rougher, until Garak was holding his face to the mattress holding his shoulders, just letting Julian’s hole clench around him tight, hot, until it was all that he could stand. Julian was so good that Garak wanted to make sure that his task red like a love letter. He’s pleased that Julian had responded in kind.

It’s a pity that he’ll never be able to see him again.

It’s far too suspicious. No matter how much of a thrill it gives him to see Tain lying there, eyes bleeding out into the darkness of the room around him, he can’t take that risk. They can never be seen together. Tain’s ridges are sickly black. Garak’s hand tightens on the coffin. They told him carefully that Tain would have died slowly from the poison and he may have even choked to death on his own tongue as his motor control failed and his body spasmed falling to the ground helpless. Garak leans forward against the side of the coffin, the hard metal pushing into the swell of his stomach, pushing the fabric of his undergarments against his slick, swollen  _ajan._  There’s a drawn in hiss, some sickness in his stomach uncurling, mired with the heat at the thought of Julian shoving the knife into Tain’s gut whispering something filthy as he does.

But then he  _does_  hear a noise and he carefully turns around, the slight pressure of the disruptor pistol against his back reassuring him of its presence. There shouldn’t be anyone else in here. Not until tomorrow. Tomorrow they can hold the great funeral, the great weeping ceremony for one of the greatest contributors to the strength of the Cardassian State. There will be plenty of weeping and lofty speeches for the man that used to lock him in the small dark cell for the rats to bite when he displeased him. There will be plenty of accolades, plenty of those shaking his hand telling him how sorry they are for his loss. He’s sorry perhaps that Tain never felt anything for him a day in his life. He’s sorry for not being stronger, for not being better. But he’s especially sorry that he still has those thoughts nearly ninety years later and sorry that he’s still afraid of those small dark spaces.

Garak doesn’t recognize the man who enters. He opens his mouth but then he stops when their eyes meet. The man is a Cardassian. The man has dark black hair slicked back, his  _chufa_  especially prominent and deep set in a fascinating counterpoint to the delicate ridges down his brow. He’s tall, he’s slim, and he’s wearing a physician’s vest. Garak has never seen him before in his life. But he’s seen those cheekbones. He’s seen that wide lovely mouth. He’s seen those dark hazel eyes. He knows exactly who it is: and if fills him with a thrilling fear. It’s Julian. He shouldn’t be here. Garak really should kill him.

But what he really wants to do is-

“I’m sorry for the intrusion I ah… I was told that I might pay my final respects here.” Julian steps into the room and shuts the door behind him. He locks it with a nervous lick of his lips. “But perhaps I have the wrong time,” he says, voice sounding hesitant, longing, his eyes sweeping over Garak’s body eagerly. “If you don’t want me here I… I can leave.” He takes another step across the red rug of the parlor. The monitors are off. Garak saw to that. No one will see them. No one will know who the man is standing in front of him is. They won’t know it’s the human whose father he murdered. No one will know it’s the doctor who assassinated the famed Enabran Tain.

“Now that would hardly be hospitable since you’ve come all this way, doctor,” Garak replies voice husky. He glances back at the coffin. “Shall I leave you alone to say your piece?”

Julian shakes his head and Garak can see those long fingers stroking at the side of his face, his arms crossed. It is a bit cold in there, but Julian shouldn’t be cold. In spite of his words, Garak makes no move to leave and Julian walks over to him. His hands are starting to shake.

“But if you leave then how would I pay my respects when… when you’re the one that I want to pay them to?” Julian asks with a small subtle tilt of his head, scenting the air with a shiver. Garak mirrors the action, tasting Julian’s familiar human tang beneath the more familiar Cardassian scent of earth, of dry desert winds.

“Then by all means, my dear,” Garak whispers, their faces, their mouths on a slow collision course, two galaxies passing too close in the universe, stars, planets colliding, their mouths meeting slowly at first before they meet a swirling vortex of two collapse stars trying to draw each other in.

Garak pulls his hair as the kiss hard, breathless, and he realizes it’s not an elaborate disguise when Julian gasps.

“There is… ah… a man Ziw Tralar with a souvenir shop on a station once known as Terok Nor… yes please there…” The ridges feel nice. Garak knows that well.“Alright not so much a souvenir shop but oddities and old books and the like and…” Julian’s hands are already snaking around Garak’s waist to his ass. “Almost like a “Needful Things” type deal- been reading more you know between p-patients- but there’s a…”

“Oh tell me that you haven’t been unfaithful to me over a Sandy Koufax baseball card, dear doctor.”

“Oh never… never would have to be one of the nineteenth century Liverpool programs… nothing less… can’t sell my soul for Manchester… Not even Everton…”

Garak’s hands are to the fastenings of Julian’s trousers and this time  _he’s_  the one who’s lust drunk.

“Do you know that the ancients used to believe… that a mask could be used to transform one into the deity Oralius?” Julian’s hands stop over his holding them there. Garak feels a thrill at his strength. Julian’s mouth is to the ridges of Garak’s neck, the left side a good hard suck that makes him rock his hips.

“It was a sphere actually… in that other world they call it a Transformation Sphere… didn’t say how he got it. Said it came from an Obsidian Order operative over there… wouldn’t say how he got it… cost me… oh…. Oh cost me… please might I suck you?” Julian asks with a sweet sober nip and he’s already undone.

“Never trust otherworld tech, my dear,” Garak gasps as Julian unfastens him and drops to his knees.

“I know… devil of a time changing back. Hurts… burns… don’t quite know if I like my willie like this. Feels good though… everting… like being hard forever then like being harder… wetter… shit I… not quite sure what I’m doing yet.” Julian’s mouth is over his  _ajan_  and he’s clearly lying because he knows exactly what he’s doing.

“You’re doing fine, yessss… more respect than any aging tailor rightly deserves…”

“You’re brilliant. Your prick is bloody brilliant, so’s your slit your ah… _ajan_ …” He slurps at it like a messy human. “Here departed, we therefore commit his body to the ground… gorgeous body, this. I love your body… every bit of it.” Julian’s mouth laps at him and he quivers with the tremors of his  _prUt_  being drawn between Julian’s lips. Guls he hopes he chokes on it.

“Is that a prayer?.. Is that what you humans pray for the damned?” Garak whispers, leaning back against the coffin. “We don’t do that of course… we mark that a man’s glory for the State save him a hell without direction and guidance.” He hasn’t forgotten the body. He hasn’t forgotten the perfumed stench of death. Perhaps they’ll bury Tain upside down like the Oralian Way heathens they make examples of: upside down so they lose their way or so that the old slug can’t find his way out of the rotting earth. Guls, he’s so hard, he can feel himself swell, evert, feel Julian’s lips around him, feel Julian’s hands under his shirt roaming over his stomach excited.  _Ssssuckpop_

“Fuck direction. God, bury me deep earth to earth between your legs. You’re so marvelously soft Lord have mercy I adore your body…” Julian’s mouth is up kissing his  _chuva_ \- that sensitive dip above his  _ajan._ “Love feeling this lovely tum’ of yours press into me… please might I choke on your prick?”

Julian asks but doesn’t wait, hands already going behind his back, pressing his mouth to the side, trembling lips sliding up up “please you promised...please...” until Garak’s hands are to his head, snapping hips, smacking, hissing, the rock of sound- a smack of his  _chuva_ , of his stomach to Julian’s face and he holds him there a moment while he tries to breathe.

“My… apologies… but this is... also the part… where I tell you how I “did in your old man” for the purposes of arousal… isn’t it?” He doesn’t let Julian respond. He knows that’s what Julian wants to hear. “Shall I start with the wire?”  _smack_  “It’s such a beautiful piece, precise, pretty, deadly; just like you, my dear.” His hips  _smack_  again. Julian moans. “I h-had to use one of the muscle relaxants we use... effective... fasssst... Guls your mouth...”

“Mmm mmm” in return,  _go on_ , he does.

“He can feel it...”  _sssuck_ “every bit... every tsss... centimeter of the wire... it cut... blood... ah...” tighter, nearly choking, nearly throwing himself back when Garak thinks it’s too much and eases up. “cutting... ssssawing his throat... warm, hot-” like Julian’s mouth, like Julian’s hole, fuck he needs to- “so hot when the artery... tsss.... up... off... turn around I need to...” Up,  _suckpop,_  Julian unstuck from his  _prUt_ , from the ground, grinding against him feverishly whispering “yes fuck you’re brilliant...” to his mouth.

“next time... next time down my throat... wish you’d spit down his but ah...” Julian is panting as Garak’s hands steady, quick, undo the fastenings on his trousers finally, panting more than breathing against each other’s lips when Garak turns him, braced on the coffin bent over, Julian’s eyes to the body inside, glassy eyes meeting glassy eyes and Garak remembers Richard Bashir’s eyes popping neatly out of his head from the pressure.

He whispers that to Julian just as he shoves his slick wet length in deep.

“There won’t be a next time,” Garak says, Julian just as molten, just as tight as the last time in this new form, those hips just as slim, just as easy to sink fingers bruising deep and make him scream. “There can’t be a next time,” Garak whispers with a hand over his mouth, feeling the pressure of air to his palm, capturing that scream as he fucks him in hard Guls... Guls... he can’t... not again... it’s too dangerous too...

“Hn... hn...” high, too high to be a true Cardassian, the only break in Julian’s otherwise flawless transformation but it’s so human, so Julian, so heavenly as he moves his hand passing over ther rest of Julian’s face and-

“Don’t cover... I want... want to see... shit... shit there.... yes... let him see us... oh.... oh God... let him watch from his tomb...” Julian swallows, Garak’s feels his throat, that neck thicker, ridges so tempting.

Garak leans in, covering him, eyes peering down over Julian’s shoulder slowing, deep, a roll of his hips and Julian’s mouth is open again but silently this time and Garak sucks hard- they’re real, whatever other world tech flooded this world holding as Julian keens softly, knees almost buckling. Let Tain’s coffin keep him adrift then in this sordid sea of blood they’re crossing. Julian prays. At least that’s what it sounds like to him so beautiful that rush of words as Garak’s mouth bites deep.

“In all... my dreams before my... my helpless sight he... he plunges,” cried softly, pitiably, so good, Julian so willing that Garak wishes he had the wire to wrap around his neck. “He plunges at me...” rock squeeze Guls he could die like this “guttering, choking, drowning...” Yes he’s drowning in Julian’s scent, his blood, his body.  _You can’t have this again and you know it... you’re insane... you’re-_

Coming... he’s coming so hard into Julian’s body that he thinks he’s off his toes, Julian’s fist banging the metal of the coffin hard, Garak’s open eyes staring down to see Tain’s sightless gaze staring up and it pulls those last thick spurts deep heavy, Guls he really thinks he’s going to die as he breathes hard against Julian, his hand moving from Julian’s hip to his  _prUt_ \- and what a lovely thing it is, slick in his hand as Garak riols his palm over it roughly.

“Is there more... to your prayer my dear?” he asks, feeling come sliding out of Julian’s hole as he gets soft,  _prUt_  slowly retracting, seed sticky down between their thighs still pressed together.

“Oh... oh it’sss... s-sssuch a morbid thing...” Julian demurs rocking into his hand. He’s such a tease.

“Tell me...”

“I’ll... I’ll tell you anything later... I... oh I’m so... so close I... the last... the last line... you’ll like it... proper Cardie and all don’tstop harderharder...”

“The rest,” Garak urges as he breathes against Julian’s skin, his scales, catching his breath before holding Julian’s hair back, head going back, to pliable, so breakable but he thinks it would take so much, so many years, so many screams and tears and beautiful death throes impaled on his  _prUt..._

“The... the old lie...” Julian gasps, laughs at this, some joke Garak doesn’t understand and the words next the translator tells him the same but Julian isn’t speaking Standard instead some more melodic sound of “ _Dulce et decorum est... pro patria mori..._ ” Translated a beat later as Julian comes, those insolent words making him yank roughly back, Julian coming as he does and Garak wants to choke him, feel those breaths struggle, feel that painful contraction of his body in that high close to death...

“We can’t ever meet again,” they both breath in tandem, both staring down at Tain.

They both finish dressing, quickly rearranging the room. Garak notices a dent in the casket but says nothing. The sight of it almost makes him aroused again. He straightens his clothes, scenting the air, the smell, the taste of death, and chemicals of the undertaker’s practiced rituals already overtaking their passion. It’s good. It’s clean. It’s done. Garak is careful to rearrange his hair stealing one final glance to the transformed Julian. He’ll spend another several minutes alone and then make his exit as well. They know better than to leave together. His expression is careful, distant, Julian looking past him. Their eyes are careful not to meet.

“Nice meeting you,” they both say at once, a slight start of surprise. And then they allow, they dare that look to the other. Julian smirks at him wickedly, a far cry from the seemingly innocent doctor he’d met in the Replimat. Julian takes a few retreating steps towards the door and Garak already knows he has no intention of staying away. Good. Neither does Garak. He smiles back.

 

“Criss Cross.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The "prayer" Garak thinks that Julian is saying is the famous poem "Dulce et Decorum est" and that entire line a the end translates to "It is sweet and proper to de for one's country" so Julian was being a bit of a smart ass with it. This is open for a sequel if I ever get the itch though I have no idea who'd want to se more of this fuckery haha. Thanks again and we'll see what happens :)


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